Marston Thrift – Hottest Day

Close to Marston Moretaine but North of the A421 is an area of land with a mix of woods, heathland and small lakes; it is large enough for it never feeling overcrowded. The southern entry has two roughly parallel paths either side of a stream, providing a pleasant cool walk in the woods before opening out into a series of paths that spread to several others offering a variety of ways to wander as many do, with their children or dogs.

In the cool of the walk through the woods I took shots of small areas  of plants which were illuminated by the these shafts of light breaking through the tree cover, before finally coming out into the bright sun. I have long been fascinated by the hoverflies that enjoy the nectar of the wild flowers, and how they genuinely seem to play in the shafts of sunlight that break through the cover of the trees to bathe the floor of the woodland paths with pools of shifting sunlight — they seem to spend much of their time alternately hovering in the beams, or dive-bombing those of their number already enjoying the beams. Whilst hovering they frequently flick through 90 degrees every so often, or move swiftly vertically up or down. They seem to be tempting photographers to try to capture them whilst hovering, but know that humans lack their reaction time, because every so often they hold station for a reasonable length of time, as if baiting you! Although I have on occasion been lucky, the odds definitely seem stacked in their favour. I enjoy a challenge, but on this occasion — Advantage hoverfly. 

I did find later that there were several around a particularly tasty flower, and as I concentrated on ones that were static others would occasionally fly within the same depth of field, which meant they were reasonably sharp.

Later, I had some fun capturing a pair of dogs jumping into the lake for sticks thrown by their owner resulting in a bit of friendly rivalry over returning it to the owner. I enjoyed my time in the woods, and I was back using my EOS R, but on this occasion with my Canon 100-400mm lens — it proved to be a good choice and it was a very pleasant way to be out and about making the most of the very warm weather.